A Mob of Rabble

The accident involving the Monster Hunting Squad occurred on the very first day of their expedition.

That morning, after the Monster Hunting Squad had assembled and organized in the prefecture city, Liu Cheng led this massive force of over fifty people. They marched out of the city in a grand procession, bolstered by the Divine Movement Technique, and headed west.

By noon, the Monster Hunting Squad had crossed hundreds of miles of terrain, arriving at the banks of the Eshui River on the westernmost edge of Wu Prefecture.

Crossing the Eshui River meant officially entering the Grey Needle Forest, where the Mountain Spirits had been lurking and residing recently. Here, Liu Cheng ordered the team to take a brief rest, cast their own spells, consume medicinal pills, and activate talismans... waiting only to charge into the enemy's nest and complete a decapitation strike with the utmost speed.

Over the past few months, this group of Mountain Spirits had been roaming through the various counties of Qiongzhou, killing and injuring countless people. The reason they had been so difficult to bring to justice was that their leader was exceptionally troublesome. It seemed to possess a precognitive ability, repeatedly leading its kin to turn misfortune into luck.

As long as this monster could be slain, the remaining Mountain Spirits would be nothing more than a disorganized mob; there would be no need to hunt them down one by one, as the clan would naturally collapse through infighting.

To ensure this surprise decapitation strike succeeded, Liu Cheng had spared no effort.

Before leaving the city, only a very small number of people knew where the Monster Hunting Squad's first stop would be. After leaving the city, Liu Cheng had the Protector Elder mask the team's tracks while he used the Divine Movement Technique to cover the entire squad, moving at full speed. It could be said that by the time they finally arrived at the banks of the Eshui River, even many within the Monster Hunting Squad did not know exactly where they were.

The surprise attack on the Grey Needle Forest was launched with the entire army, a strike as swift as thunder. Even the elders, who were supposed to be guarding the flanks and not directly participating, were prepared to strike at any moment, all to ensure there would be no room for error.

And yet, this thunderous blow landed on nothing.

The Grey Needle Forest was home to various exotic beasts and countless minor monster spirits, and even powerful monsters lurking in the deep pools of the dense forest, but the one thing it lacked was the very group of Mountain Spirits they were determined to destroy.

Let alone the mutated leader, there wasn't even a single wild, solitary Mountain Spirit to be found.

The habitat specifically marked by Liu Cheng contained only a cave littered with human remains, with several half-eaten human corpses hanging outside... it looked like a provocation.

Clearly, the Mountain Spirit leader had foreseen the impending crisis and led its entire clan to migrate in time, perfectly avoiding Liu Cheng's thunderous strike.

This missed strike was completely unexpected, leaving even many Golden Core elders momentarily at a loss.

Fortunately, Liu Cheng stepped forward in time, using a few self-deprecating jokes and a temporary reward to stabilize the morale of the troops.

Afterward, he did not hesitate and gave only one order.

Pursue.

Although the group of Mountain Spirits had migrated in time, they could not have run very far, nor could they completely erase the tracks of an entire clan on the move. Therefore, even if this sure-fire strike had missed, the outcome would not change as long as they followed the traces left behind by the Mountain Spirits.

Furthermore, as a precaution, Liu Cheng demanded that the Monster Hunting Squad advance as a tight group. Even if the pursuit was slower, they were absolutely forbidden from rashly splitting their forces.

This was a sound decision, and no one had any objections. Thus, they pursued, venturing deeper and deeper... until at one moment, it felt as if they had invisibly crossed a certain boundary.

The Golden Core elders who were protecting the team suddenly, completely, vanished without a trace!

Everyone had clearly been advancing in a tight group as Liu Cheng requested. A moment before, people could still catch glimpses of the elders lurking in the shadows beside the disciples of the noble families, their figures faintly visible... but the next moment, those faint figures had abruptly turned into dappled tree shadows!

The sudden, bizarre change nearly caused the morale of the Monster Hunting Squad to collapse on the spot. Several disciples of the noble families were particularly panicked, itching to turn and flee.

It took Liu Cheng some time to settle the hearts of his men. Afterward, he no longer insisted on the pursuit, instead leading everyone to turn back the way they came, striving to first exit the Grey Needle Forest and return to the banks of the Eshui River to regroup.

And so, this departure became an endless journey.

From the Eshui River to the Grey Needle Forest, the surprise attack on the way there had taken little more than ten minutes; even counting the pursuit, it had barely exceeded an hour. Yet, retracing their steps, they walked for the better part of a day. By the time the sky began to darken, the group still had not managed to shake off the grey, thorny trees.

They were not walking in circles, nor were they trapped by any supernatural phenomena; they were genuinely heading back in a straight line along their original path, yet the road ahead seemed to have no end.

At the same time, the missing Golden Core elders had still not appeared.

Consequently, Liu Cheng made a prompt decision. He ordered the group to halt their advance and set up a temporary camp within the Grey Needle Forest to plan for the long term.

During this time, he led by example, taking the initiative to bring out many precious family heirloom artifacts and talismans. Relying on his own strength, he constructed a stable defensive position in the forest. With him taking the lead, several other scions of noble families followed suit, using their artifacts to pile together a Qimen Hundred Treasures Formation. In theory, even a Nascent Soul powerhouse would have to go to great lengths to break through such a formation.

After a night of rest, the team set out on their journey once again the following morning.

At this point, the Monster Hunting Squad still nominally regarded Liu Cheng as their leader, and the direction of their advance was determined by him. Liu Cheng did not hold anything back, candidly explaining the reasoning behind his decisions to all the team members.

This included his specialized study of the Qimen Daoist derivation arts, his life-bound artifact, the Zhoutian Xuanji Compass, and various rare auxiliary calculation talismans...

Although by now anyone could see that the bizarre nature of the situation had truly exceeded the control of this eldest son of the Liu Family, he was undeniably doing his utmost to seek a way out for everyone.

Others might have had doubts or objections... but no one could offer a better solution.

Thus, people continued to follow Liu Cheng's instructions, moving in a tight-knit group through the Grey Needle Forest, searching for a way out together.

This search lasted for two days.

Over those two days, the group went almost without sleep or rest, walking until they were exhausted, following the direction indicated by Liu Cheng.

They could no longer remember how many hills they had crossed, how many streams they had waded through, or how many unlucky indigenous minor demons they had encountered. At one point, they even ran into an ancient tree spirit that had attained the Dao centuries ago, and it took a great deal of effort to ensure both sides remained at peace.

However, the way out that everyone longed for remained nowhere to be seen.

That evening, the conflict erupted as expected. Kang Pingxiang, a young master from the second-greatest noble family of Wujun, was the first to challenge him, demanding that Liu Cheng step down and yield his position. Although Liu Cheng tried his best to defend himself and lay out the pros and cons, his repeated failures in decision-making meant he no longer held the support of the majority.

Thus, starting on the third day, the team was led by Kang Pingxiang. He, too, did his utmost to find a way out for everyone, but ultimately, he only caused the group to waste another day in vain, during which they encountered several dangerous situations.

From the fourth day on, the team returned to Liu Cheng's command. Having learned from the lessons of the previous days, he significantly adjusted his calculation methods and faintly glimpsed a hope of a breakthrough.

But in the end, it was still all for nothing. People wasted another two days and still could not walk out of the secret realm of the Grey Needle Forest.

By now, the morale of the group was fractured. Even the rogue cultivators, who were indifferent to the monster hunting and only cared about their daily wages, began to feel restless and uneasy. All sorts of chaotic thoughts intertwined, and the situation was on the verge of exploding.

Finally, Kang Pingxiang challenged him again, and this time, his target was the group of Desolate People rogue cultivators within the Monster Hunting Squad.

"He said that such a predicament must be caused by an internal traitor."

"The traitor must have used heterodox evil arts to pollute the spiritual energy relied upon by the Monster Hunting Squad, causing the team to become lost in the Grey Needle Forest, and causing the superior derivation arts of the two noble masters to fail."

"And such heterodox evil arts must come from the Desolate People rogue cultivators, with their impure bloodlines and unclean Daoist hearts."

It is hard to say how much of Kang Pingxiang's accusation stemmed from reason and how much was purely an emotional outburst... but once he voiced those accusations and doubts, the situation became irreversible.

In Qiongzhou, accusing a Desolate Person of being a "traitor" was an extremely serious matter, almost no different from drawing a blade and attacking someone directly.

Under normal circumstances, the group of rogue cultivators might have forced themselves to endure Kang Pingxiang's accusations for the sake of the generous reward.

But at that moment, the rogue cultivators' rationality had long since been worn away by days of confusion.

Infighting broke out on the spot. Several hot-headed rogue cultivators attacked immediately... and, unsurprisingly, were beaten by Kang Pingxiang until their bones were broken and they were in a miserable state.

A few timid rogue cultivators tried to flee in the chaos, but the young master of the Hu Family viewed them as having a guilty conscience and, together with Luo Xiao, broke their legs.

Fortunately, at the last moment, Liu Cheng forcibly stepped in to quell the conflict, preventing the infighting from becoming too tragic... but even he could no longer mend the fractured morale.

That night, the team announced its split. The scions of the noble families barely managed to maintain one team, while the rogue cultivators were all cast out.

In the strange and unpredictable Grey Needle Forest, the implication of kicking out a group of rogue cultivators, who were already relatively weaker in strength, was self-evident.

Many of the abandoned rogue cultivators were instantly overwhelmed by despair, while others had their hearts filled with rage.

But for Zhu Ying, this infighting and split was exactly what she had hoped for.

From the very beginning, she had never wanted to deal with that group of noble scions... If it weren't for the fact that the formation eye used to absorb the spiritual energy of the earth veins was controlled by the captain, Liu Cheng, and required his permission to cultivate freely, Zhu Ying might have left the team and gone solo the moment she reported in at the commandery city.

The wilderness of Qiongzhou was certainly dangerous, and the Mountain Spirits were by no means kind, so the risks of hunting alone were self-evident. But even so, it was better than having to read the expressions of noble scions...

Moreover, while getting lost with the Monster Hunting Squad, Zhu Ying had discovered something else.

The spiritual energy of heaven and earth within this Grey Needle Forest was exceptionally dense, not at all inferior to the commandery city that monopolized all the spiritual essence of the entire commandery... At this point, she no longer had a single reason to compromise.

After separating from the noble scions, Zhu Ying did not look for any fellow rogue cultivators to partner with. Instead, she resolutely ventured deep into the dense forest alone, following her instincts to find her way.

Not the direction of escape, but the direction of the hunt.

As early as the moment she stepped into the Grey Needle Forest, Zhu Ying had actually faintly sensed that the group of Mountain Spirits was not in the location Liu Cheng had calculated. Later, she saw the Monster Hunting Squad fall into an invisible maze, yet neither Liu Cheng nor Kang Pingxiang seemed to notice it.

As time passed and they remained lost, Zhu Ying became increasingly certain of her judgment.

This Grey Needle Forest, where the spirits resided, was not the home turf of those noble scions who prided themselves on their pure bloodlines; it was her home turf.

It was the home turf—the hunting ground—of Zhu Ying, a Desolate Person carrying the blood of the demon race.

Now, the hunter had finally shaken off all restraints.

The hunt was about to begin.

Many thanks to book friend 20220625071538948 for the generous tip!

And to Yu Luo Ling Luan for the character tip for the protagonist!